NAPF’s 29th Annual Evening for Peace Honors Senator De Brum

The Distinguished Peace Leadership Award is presented annually to individuals who have demonstrated courageous leadership in the cause of peace. Past recipients include His Holiness the XIVth Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Captain Jacques Cousteau, Dr. Helen Caldicott, King Hussein of Jordan, and 23 others.

This year’s recipient, Senator de Brum, has worked tirelessly for peace and justice on behalf of his country, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (R.M.I.). Like all Marshall Islanders alive between 1946 and 1958, he has directly experienced the impact of 67 nuclear weapon tests, which the United States directed at the waters of the Marshall Islands during that period. These tests had an explosive power equivalent to one-and-one-half Hiroshima bombs exploded daily for 12 years and resulted in massive environmental and deleterious health effects. De Brum personally witnessed most of the detonations and was nine years old on March 1, 1954, when he experienced the most powerful of the explosions, code-named BRAVO.

He went on to become one of the first Marshall Islanders to graduate from college and focused on helping his people to extricate themselves from the legacy of U.S. nuclear testing. He played a key role in the negotiations that led to the first compact of free association between the U.S. and the Republic of the Marshall Islands, and participated in the development of his country’s Constitution. Senator de Brum has also focused his attentions on the more recent challenges of global warming and its effects on atoll populations. He remains deeply engaged in seeking justice for the people of his country and an end to the nuclear threats that confront humanity.

The Evening for Peace is the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation’s principal fundraising event, supporting its efforts to build a more secure and peaceful world, free of nuclear weapons. The event begins at 5:30 p.m. with a reception and silent auction, followed at 6:30 p.m. by dinner and the award presentation. Event tickets and sponsorship opportunities are available online click here or by calling (805) 965-3443.

The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation was founded in 1982. Now in its 30th year, its mission is to educate and advocate for peace and a world free of nuclear weapons and to empower peace leaders. The Foundation is comprised of individuals and organizations worldwide who realize the imperative for peace in the Nuclear Age. The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation is a non-profit, non-partisan organization with consultative status to the United Nations Economic and Social Council and is recognized by the UN as a Peace Messenger Organization. For more information, call 805.965.3443.